Public Records:

Newspaper: Open records on Gibbons’ concealed-gun permit

Tuesday, June 2, 2009 | 2 a.m.

Carson City —

Oops! Governor has nine guns (4-10-2008)

Archive of Sun politics stories

Politics: The Early Line

Nevadans should be able to find out whether authorities suspended their governor’s permit to carry a concealed handgun, a newspaper’s lawyers will argue today.

And if state Supreme Court decides the newspaper is right, all concealed handgun permit records could be open to public scrutiny.

The Reno Gazette-Journal has been seeking public access to Gov. Jim Gibbons’ permit records for more than a year. The paper wanted to investigate after his April 2008 statement that he surrendered his handgun permit after belatedly realizing he had not completed the required training for his nine handguns — even though he had signed an application saying that he had.

The false information on the application appeared to be grounds for suspension or revocation of the permit.

Scott Glogovac, the newspaper’s attorney, said citizens have a right to know whether the governor has been disciplined.

Last year, after Washoe County Sheriff Mike Haley, whose office handled the governor’s permit records, refused to divulge the information, the newspaper sued. Washoe County District Attorney Nathan Edwards argued that the records are confidential under Nevada law.

The newspaper contended that the law applies only to the application itself, but Washoe County District Judge Janet Berry ruled that information about the status of any handgun permit issued to the governor could not be released because the intent of the law was to protect the name of the permit holder, whether that person is the governor or not.

Glogovac argues that it’s difficult to tell from state law how far the Legislature wanted to extend confidentiality of concealed weapons records. The law, for example, doesn’t address whether the permit itself or records that relate to the revocation or suspension of the permit are confidential, he said.

Glogovac alleges that the Washoe judge “plainly disregarded the unequivocal mandate of Nevada’s Public Records Act that any claim of confidentiality as to public records be narrowly construed.”

Barry Smith, executive director of the Nevada Press Association, said Monday that for him “the issue here has little to do with guns and is all about government accountability. This is an example of the government wanting to regulate something, expecting information from its residents and placing requirements and restrictions on them, but then not sharing that information with the public. There’s no outside oversight to check to see if it’s being handled properly.”

Washoe authorities say the state needs to protect the permit-holder. If the permit information were public, “any would-be hacker could walk in off the street and discover whether their potential victim has a permit.”

“In cases of high-profile figures, the already compelling need for the government to keep this information confidential is even more acute,” Edwards said.

They “are commonly the target of dangerous and deranged individuals,” he added.

So is that why the governor needs a permit to carry a gun?

Daniel Burns, the governor’s spokesman, said Gibbons does have a concealed-weapons permit, but “we have no interest in discussing whether he carries a concealed weapon or not.

“We just as soon would like to keep his personal life personal,” Burns said.

Sun reporter Jeff German contributed to this story.

Comments
Print
E-mail
Share
- Facebook
- Fark
- Digg
- Reddit
- Stumble
Tweet

Discussion: comments so far…

Comments are moderated by Las Vegas Sun editors. Our goal is not to limit the discussion, but rather to elevate it. Comments should be relevant and contain no abusive language. Comments that are off-topic, vulgar, profane or include personal attacks will be removed. Full comments policy. Additionally, we now display comments from trusted commenters by default. Those wishing to become a trusted commenter need to verify their identity or sign in with Facebook Connect to tie their Facebook account to their Las Vegas Sun account. For more on this change, read our story about how it works and why we did it.

Only trusted comments are displayed on this page. Untrusted comments have expired from this story.

No trusted comments have been posted.

By neiman1

June 2, 2009

8:52 a.m.

Flag

All politics all the time. This has nothing to do with the issue, this is just more of the Sun trying to tear down the guy that kept Nevada from even more spending and taxes.
By bbkld5

June 2, 2009

9:01 a.m.

Flag

"The Reno Gazette-Journal has been seeking public access to Gov. Jim Gibbons' permit records for more than a year."
1. It's the RGJ seeking the records, not the Sun.
2. It's a reasonable request to ensure an elected official followed through on a public declaration.
3. No matter if he did or did not surrender the license, it probably won't change anyone's mind about the governor.
By Judy

June 2, 2009

10:13 a.m.

Flag

"We just as soon would like to keep his personal life personal," Burns said.

This has to be the quote of the century. Here is a guy, Governor Zero, whjoo very publically assaulted a woman, quarrels with his wife (with whom he is "very happy") send text messages to other married women in the early morning hours..... And he would like to keep his personal life person????

This guy is a psychopath!